


Wounds We Leave in the Sea

by Melusine10



Series: The Archipelago [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Bathing/Washing, Cannibalism, Caretaking, Epistolary, Handcuffs, Language of Flowers, M/M, Medical Trauma, Murder Husbands, No one needs to help Will, Porn, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Fall (Hannibal), Role Reversal, Surgery, This is My Design, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Tum of Dreams, gross sobbing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-14
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-08-08 17:45:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7767262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melusine10/pseuds/Melusine10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An antidote for the HeAteUs and the lovesick cannibal, written for the #ItsStillBeautiful challenge on the one year anniversary of TWOTL. A story in which William 'Wing-It-With-Indecision' Graham actually planned the fall - and their survival - with malice and forethought. Feat. medical intimacy, Graham cracker wrath, and two murderous idiots in love. Told from a very hurt Hannibal's point of view.</p><p>“Dahlias are the August birth flower. Are we celebrating a birth day?”<br/>“Oh yes,” Will said. “Ours. We were reborn this month. Born properly at last - together. Baptized by blood in the womb of the sea.”<br/>Hannibal smiled at the whimsy in Will's words. “Some would say you have selected a controversial color.”<br/>“Such a deep crimson it almost looks black.”<br/>“Black dahlias for the dragon's blood we were born in.” Hannibal stroked the miniature knife blade petals on one of the blossoms. “Black dahlias also symbolize betrayal, Will.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Antidote

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mokuyoubi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mokuyoubi/gifts), [peacefrog](https://archiveofourown.org/users/peacefrog/gifts), [canton](https://archiveofourown.org/users/canton/gifts).



> I am gifting this story to three people whose contributions to the fandom I greatly admire and enjoy. I hope they don't mind. This may not be their thing. 
> 
> Although I've already written a post-fall story, I wanted to pursue an idea where Will intended for them to survive the fall and Hannibal is left helpless in his care. I guess role reversal is my Hannigram kink?? I don't even know.
> 
> Lastly - I have zero medical knowledge. In general, it's probably recommended by professionals to not get shot by a serial killer fixated on William Blake and then let your idiot empath beloved try to fix you up in a shack in the Appalachians. Don't be like these two. Tell your loved ones you love them when and while you can.

<>

Consciousness came unexpectedly, like the devastating leaps of a tornado. “Don’t talk,” a voice warned. Shadowy hands adjusted a vine of tubing and disappeared.

Hannibal knew intuitively that Will understood his confusion. How many times had Will awoken to the horror of his shattered body? Though he’d lived through plenty, this particular experience was new for Hannibal.

“Shhh. I’ve got you,” Will soothed. He spoke calmly and reassured him that he would be alright. The worst was over, or so he said.

Hannibal’s tongue clicked uselessly for sound.

“You’re thirsty. Here.” Will set an ice cube on his lips and let it melt. Hannibal struggled repeatedly against his helplessness in slow squirming movements. He felt kind hands petting his arm, brushing fingers through his salted hair.

Hours later, the sedative dulled and Hannibal opened his bleary, unfocused eyes. Will was shifting him, rolling his frame and moving his limbs to position him. “Almost done.” He bit off a strip of medical tape and pressed it against the wide gauze winding Hannibal’s torso.

“Where…” he managed.

Will paused and leaned over him so he could see his caretaker. “Appalachians. Just rest. We’re safe.”

 

<>

It was sometime in the middle of the night when he woke, rustling in his coarse sheets. “Will,” Hannibal called. Will had nodded off in an armchair in the corner, a book forgotten on his chest. He startled at the sound of Hannibal’s voice and was on his feet in an instant. The book clattered to the ground. A small lamp in the corner served as a night light, casting a low golden hue up the wood-paneled wall. Will automatically went for a glass of water and tipped it to his lips. He skimmed a thumb over his cheeks. Hannibal didn’t need to be told that his condition was serious. He could feel it bone-deep. His body must be patterned in purples and blues.

“More, please,” he croaked.

“Of course.” Will’s bare feet echoed on squeaky cabin floors as he made the short trip to the kitchen sink. He returned with a plastic pitcher clinking with ice water. It took glass after glass before Hannibal’s parched throat was somewhat sated.

“How did we get here?” he asked.

Will sat slowly on the edge of the mattress, careful not to shake the bed. “You think I engineered our deaths without a backup plan. You think I tossed us off a cliff on a whim.”

Hannibal closed his eyes, too weak to argue. Of course he assumed the impulsive man had tossed them off a cliff on a whim. He was all too happy to follow. "Is that not what happened?"

“Chiyoh was waiting for us with my boat. I called her while you were changing at the house.”

“Is she - ?”

“Already gone. About a day and a half ago.”

“How ever were you able to find her?”

“We keep in touch.”

“All this time?”

“Yeah.”

“Another stray in your pack.” A shadow of sickening pain lurched across his features as he tried to adjust his head on the pillow.

Will sucked at his teeth and shrugged. “Chiyoh owes me for her freedom. We came to an understanding while you were…away.” He pulled the sheet back to check Hannibal’s gut wound and the tape on his broken ribs.

“You make a fine nurse.”

“Let’s hope I make a better doctor. I need you to look at your gunshot and tell me how badly I’ve fucked it up.” Will found a hand mirror and began peeling back the tape. Before he took off the padding, he hit the overhead light. 

Hannibal winced in the sudden brightness. He strained to look down and angle the mirror with precision. “You used betadine and shaved the area. That’s a start.”

“The stitches are garbage. I know. I’m sorry.”

Hannibal traced the thin line of tidy, if slightly uneven knots and smiled. He had been sewn up industriously and would bear a striking resemblance to one of Will’s fishing flies. “Better than most medical students. An impressive first job given the circumstances. Walk me through what is underneath this and what you did.”

“It was a through and through. I debrided it with saline – we didn’t have much on hand, which is why you’re so dehydrated. Widened the exit wound there to get a better view of things with a sterile scalpel. I figured you wouldn’t mind, given how you opened me up. Then I manually felt for anything loose or gushing blood.”

“How far were you able to proceed with the visual inspection?”

“Your liver looked intact and I was able to get under it to check your kidney. I remembered what you showed me when we dismantled Randall Tier.”

“Tier was dead, Will. I - as grateful as I am for the fact - am not. There will be severe bruising,” he chided. If only his blood loss and shock hadn’t come on so quickly. He would have thoroughly enjoyed the look of concentration on Will’s face as he dug around amongst his viscera.

“Your intestines weren’t nicked as far as I could tell.”

“The smell would be unmistakable.”

“I think we’re clear of sepsis. Your temperature has been slightly elevated but stable. It’s been three days. It feels like a year.”

Hannibal let the mirror slide to the mattress and his head lolled to the side, exhausted by the small effort. The occasional table that had doubled as his surgical tray was still set up against the wall. A piece of vinyl tubing stained brown with dried blood lay curled there. His brow furrowed. There was a catheter attached to one end and an arterial cannula on the other. A chill settled over him.

“Will, what is that?”

“Uh…that is something you may not entirely be thrilled about.”

Hannibal’s eyes flew to Will’s bandaged wrist and found a corresponding bruised mark on his right inner elbow.

“You were bleeding out. I thought we were going to lose you. We could barely find your pulse.”

“Tell me you didn’t try what I think you tried.” Direct transfusion hadn’t been used in field medicine since the American Civil War. Even with modern tools, cannulating a radial artery and performing an end-to-end anastomosis was an exceedingly skilled task.

“Yeah, well. It seemed like our only option. I’m O negative. Chiyoh was pretty ballsy. She kept stabbing until we got the artery tapped and we just let it run until I nearly passed out. I don’t know how much blood I had left to give, but I gave you whatever I had to spare.”

“You savage, remarkable boy.” He strained to touch the crook of his arm where Will’s blood had entered him, filled him. It was a miracle Will hadn’t killed himself trying to help him; more miraculous still that he’d not damaged the nerves in his wrist or bled to death in his attempts. He felt a near religious awe swell in his chest. “You’ve penetrated me wrist-deep and now your lifeblood runs through my veins.”

The praise elicited a shy smile. It tugged at the bandage on Will’s face and he touched it in pain. The gauze began to turn pink.

“You’ve pulled one of your stitches.”

“No stitches to pull. I was waiting for you to wake up.”

Hannibal couldn’t fathom why. Perhaps their supplies were too limited. “I assume we are out of Lidocaine?”

“No.”

“The scar will likely be worse now. I may have to reopen it if it has already begun to heal incorrectly.”

“I don’t care. Just so long as it is bound up by your hands. The dragon isn’t getting the last word in on my face.”

It was Hannibal’s turn to feel a flush of pleasure coloring his sharp cheeks. He spread his palms out to see whether he was stable enough to operate. He had a slight tremor, but nothing that wouldn’t clear with better hydration and more energy. Ever prescient, Will anticipated his train of thought.

“Think you could eat something? There are eggs in the fridge. No other protein, I’m afraid. I’ve got Sevilla oranges though.”

“Please.”

Hannibal drifted off to the sound of clinking pans and slapping cupboard doors. It seemed as though Will was gone for an eternity before he came in with a heaping pile of scrambled eggs and fresh squeezed orange juice. Will fed him small forkfuls, insisted on blowing on each. His lips wrapped around the tines each round, savoring the creamy flavor. They stared at each other in silence, each movement perfectly coordinated and in sync. This moment lodged itself in the halls of his memory palace. Protein scramble in Minnesota. Soup in the hospital. Hot steaming coffees on the road. Long pig on Chandler Square. A fragrant broth in Florence. Hannibal could taste each and every meal they had shared as though they were still fresh on his tongue.

“Your eggs are cooked to perfection. Thank you.”

“You're welcome,” Will said and scrubbed at his beard.

"And thank you for saving my life. You alone seem to exercise the power of God over me."

"We're not out of the woods yet."

Hannibal relaxed back into his pillow and looked at the shimmying leaves outside. The curtains framing the window were hideous. "Not out of the woods yet. But we will be."

<> 

 

Will was doing dishes when he heard the thump and cry of agony.

“Hannibal!” he yelled when he found him crumpled on the ground. Throwing the kitchen towel he had draped over a shoulder to the side, he wrestled to get him back into the bed. His stab wounds made hefting the large man’s weight nearly impossible.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

“I had to urinate,” he said in a shallow breath.

Will rolled his eyes. “So help me god, I will chain you to this bed if you don’t stay put while you heal.”

In spite of his pain, a hint of amusement danced over Hannibal’s mouth. It didn't escape Will's notice.

“Behave yourself,” Will warned. He slipped out and returned with an old shallow pan. Reaching under the sheet, he nestled it between Hannibal’s legs.

“I realize this is an indignity, but I’m going to need you to pee for me.”

Hannibal searched his face, curious about the game they were playing. What wounds had they left behind in the sea? Something had fallen with them, fallen away. Perhaps it was dropped forgiveness and the bitter scorn of heartbreak, washed away in the sacrament of blood and baptismal rite. Will had freed him from incarceration, killed with him, killed for him. He had planned this escape with malice and forethought. He was confident and in control. In the full bloom of his transformation, his simple request for submission was too alluring. Like the leap on the cliff, he would succumb. He would follow where Will Graham lead. 

“Anything for you, dear Will.”

“Do you want me to help?”

Hannibal nodded. “Please.”

Will did not hesitate. He freed Hannibal’s soft length from the generic boxers he had been dressed in and gently pulled the foreskin back and aimed down. Hannibal let go and the urine made a metallic splash whose timbre changed as it flowed. He watched Will’s impassive face. If the intimacy of holding another man’s cock in his hand while he pissed affected him, he did not show it. Will gave him a little shake when he was finished and tucked him back away. He glanced into the dented, improvisatory chamber pot.

“You’re still dehydrated.”

“Perhaps more of that delicious orange juice of yours?”

“Coming right up.”

 

<> 

 

“A little to the left,” Hannibal suggested.

Will tipped the desk lamp to angle the light. Performing surgery from bed – even as something as basic as a set of stitches – was less than ideal. Their sparse three room cabin, which Will described but Hannibal could not explore, was deep in a forest where the light that filtered down was always dappled and fair. Will had chosen this location with care – remote and completely off grid. He assured Hannibal the nearest neighbors were miles up a dirt road. Not even the turnoff was easily found.

Once they had their makeshift theatre set up, Will positioned himself as close as possible, caging his arms around either side of Hannibal’s head. They had tried propping Hannibal upright with pillows, but the pressure on his organs turned him green and they swiftly abandoned that effort. He was prone now and Will leaned down into his breath, closing his eyes as the syringe pushed into his torn flesh.

Hannibal was glad the surgical gloves were a size too small. Better than too baggy, given how closely he wanted to lay each precise track of thread. He abhorred the obstruction of ill-fitting things. He intended to do his finest work yet, irrespective of the circumstances. Never as an ER surgeon did he hesitate, but then, trauma surgery had little time to be bothered with aesthetics. It was one of the principle reasons he left. Today, he felt a little like a conservationist before setting his cleaning brush on the oil. He was about to restore a Michelangelo and there was no room for error.

Will held perfectly still. Beads of sweat began to flower on his forehead and collect from the effort. Hannibal paused to have Will collect them with a square cotton pad, lest they contaminate his clean canvas. By the end of it, he was sweating from concentration too, moisture mottling his upper lip and pooling in the crinkled lines of eyes. His patient _qua_ assisting nurse dabbed him off periodically when requested. Twice he stopped completely to reassess where he would settle his needle before forging ahead. Once he was dissatisfied with the tension on a knot and clipped the stitch and redid it entirely.

“Your perfectionism is really inconvenient for my arms,” Will complained. He was starting to shake.

“Nevertheless, your face will be grateful for it.”

“Will I be terribly ugly, Doctor?” He tried to sound playful, but there was real concern behind his words.

Hannibal long suspected that Will Graham knew precisely what a uniquely stunning creature he was. It was dealing with the emotional repercussions of how others saw him that was terrifying – the lust, the covetousness, the petty jealousy. Wading through a flood of desires for his body, never to be entirely certain of his own self perception. They hadn't addressed that issue in therapy. They would, starting now. No time like the present.

Hannibal tied off the last stitch. He ventured a stroke on the numbed side of Will’s cheek and let his fingers wander over his jaw and neck. “If you are asking what I see when I look at you, then I must tell you that I will always see the wrathful lamb who slaughtered a dragon and went on to tackle the devil himself. But if I’ve done my job, there will hardly be a scar there to remind me of that. You will always be beautiful to me, in every regard.”

"Yours or mine?"

"Yes, is the answer to that, I think."

" 'If you saw me every day, forever?'" Will recalled.

"I will always remember _this_ time." 

Will bit his bottom lip and suppressed a smile. He closed the distance between them, lips ghosting just above Hannibal’s forehead in hesitation, before pressing a chaste kiss at his temple. “You still smell like blood and seawater,” Will whispered.

 

<> 

 

Sudsy liquid sluiced from the sponge down Will’s wrist. He patted Hannibal down in slow swipes, returning occasionally to the bowl of warm water in bed beside him on a towel. Hannibal watched in fascination as Will studied his body and discovered its mundane mysteries. He considered narrating the faded imperfections, the old scars, his private reserve of battle wounds. Instead he found he was content to silently participate in this intimate act. He was compliant as Will mapped out his constellations of freckles, the ropey veins that graced his leonine arms, his curves and valleys. Will lingered on his neck and chest before tracing the trail of soft hair that chased down his belly to his groin. He paused at his stomach, chewing at a thought for a long time before finding the right words. Concern skittered across his face. “Did they take care of you at the BSHCI?”

“I enjoyed certain privileges under Dr. Bloom’s supervision, you will recall.”

“No abusive nurses I need to go back and kill?”

Hannibal smirked. “Nurses? No.” Now was not the time to mention his promise to Alana. Not when Will was confessing the unspeakable worry he had borne alone for three excruciating years.

“You’ve lost muscle mass.”

“Yard privileges were not part of the agreement. Yoga was a suitable alternative in the absence of any equipment.”

“Did you get the same food as the inmates downstairs?”

“Calling it ‘food’ might be overly generous. The institution’s cook, I believe, tried what she could with the state’s limited funding. It was always too starchy and fatty, nevermind incomparably vile.”

“Not enough meat for your tastes. Not the right cuts, that’s for sure.” Will gave a crooked smile, avoiding pulling at his right cheek. “I was only there two months and I grew a tum too.” Hannibal frowned at the mention of this less pleasant change in his aging body and Will set his palm down on his belly and squeezed. “I like your tum,” he said conspiratorially. He dipped the sponge in the water and continued further south.

“What else do you like?” Hannibal asked, trying to maintain an even tone despite knowing the territory they were now headed. His body held no embarrassment for him, only a very probable indelicacy for Will. The warm hand suddenly cupping his testicles made him jump. The feel of heat and wet on the head of his penis, down his perineum, and between his cheeks was obscenely pleasant. Will’s touch was clinical, but it made no difference. He grew absurdly hard in his hand within seconds. Three years of celibacy and 24 hour video monitoring had not made for an active carnal life. It had, however, given him plenty of time to imagine a host of scenarios that would bring about circumstances similar to the present.

“I always figured you had a reason to be so confident. I guess it is true what they say.”

“What do they say, Will?” Defaulting to his psychiatrist’s stock questions sounded ridiculous and they both knew it. He was breathing in shallow pants while his member flexed and strained for contact and he stared out the window as though something outside were more interesting.

Will snorted. “Can't just graciously take a compliment when one is given? So very rude, Hannibal. People might say you’re a giant dick.”

“Most people prefer to avoid backhanded compliments.”

“I’m not most people,” Will retorted.

“No. You most certainly are not.”

 

Will finished toweling him off. Hannibal was still rock hard. Even the sensation of the towel on his skin felt erotic now. “Should I take care of that for you?” Will asked. “You look like you need some relief.”

The small, pathetic creature of need he buried deep within him shrieked to be freed from its iron cage. Hannibal, meanwhile, was left uncharacteristically speechless while he grappled with the demon. It took him a moment to quiet his baser instinct and tidy himself with a veneer of civility. “I very much appreciate the offer and...the topic certainly deserves to be revisited…at length, I should imagine, given our new arrangement,” he said. “However, given the nature of the injuries in my abdominal wall, any agitation would be extraordinarily ill advised at present.”

Will quirked his eyebrows in suspicion, shrugged, and began re-bandaging and re-taping his injuries. As Hannibal waited for him to finish, his exposed skin grew cold in the open air and goosebumps chased across his arms and legs. Will pulled the blanket up high around his neck and, pausing, lifted it up and crawled under. He barely made contact with him except to press his nose and lips against his shoulder. Hannibal’s hand ventured up to tangle his fingers in Will’s hair.

“If you _were_ well enough…” Will started. He couldn’t quite manage the rest. The question hung over them awkwardly.

“What's on your mind?”

“I…missed you.”

Hannibal smiled slyly. “And I missed you.”

“You knew. You knew it would drive me crazy thinking of you locked up and waiting for me to react.”

“The proverbial ball was in your court. I had rather hoped you might react sooner than three years.”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”

Hannibal swallowed. A nervous tick. “Did it?”

Will slid an arm over his chest, a hand settling around Hannibal’s shoulder. “After everything we’ve been through together, are we still dancing around each other and sparring with metaphors and aphorisms?”

“It would seem so.”

“Bedelia told me in no uncertain terms that you were in love with me. I’ve never heard someone speak of love so hatefully.”

Hannibal chuckles, thinking of her sustained state of self-imposed horror in Italy. “Dr. Du Maurier lives in the eclipse of denial. She fixes blame on others for the unrequited desires she is incapable of realizing herself. She was greatly disappointed with the husband she hoped to have.”

“Neither one of us have been very good husbands.”

“Perhaps that has been for the best, in the end.”

"Yes. Perhaps."

They laid there quietly then, each pondering the other, neither quite able to find the right words. It was Will, surprisingly, who broke through the last wall they had yet to breach. It was the final fort, torn asunder with the simplest of sentiments. 

“I’ve loved you since the day you called me a mongoose and insisted I’d find you interesting.”

The memory hit Hannibal with the same force as their fall. Ruffle haired Will Graham in his grey nightshirt and underwear. The smell of Will and fennel and musty motel carpet. The two of them incapable of not smiling at the discovery of each other. True smiles. Smiles they carried with them as they walked through the carnage of their lives.

Emotion welled up so strongly in Hannibal’s throat it was if he was drowning again in the sea. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t breathe. He was dying from the love sickness which had poisoned him for so long. His fist tightened in Will’s curls, pulling him closer. The emotion refused to stop and it swelled and crested and poured out from his eyes. From somewhere beyond himself, he heard a choked cry.

“Hannibal…Hannibal…” Will crawled over him and, holding his face, shushed him. The sound of his name in Will’s mouth only made the tears flow harder. Will wiped at them with his thumbs and continued to comfort him.

“Shhh. It’s okay. I’m here. Hannibal. I’m here. I love you and it’s okay.”

“The painkillers...are affecting me,” Hannibal tried pathetically.

“It’s not the painkillers. It’s not the painkillers and you know it. It’s the pain and it's the cure - the _antidote_ to all the madness we’ve visited on each other. There’s no more waiting. No more suspense. We’ve had our red wedding. We have each other. No more being alone together. We’re just together. Finally.”

Hannibal was sobbing unrestrained now into the back of his hand.

“Say it. I need to hear you say it.” 

Three easy words.

“Tell me. Please,” he urged. “Please, Hannibal. So I know.”

Succumb. Will wanted him to succumb.

Hannibal growled a cry of frustration and sucked in a breath. He gathered the air and the courage and the syllables came from somewhere near his bursting heart. It was a terrible feeling, to make such sounds. They were but simple, stupid sounds, freed from the dungeon of his memory palace where he thought he had buried them with the dead. “ _Aš tave myliu_ ,” he mouthed. “ _Aš tave myliu_.”

“Yeah?” Will asked. "Do you?"

Hannibal nodded. “ _Aš tave myliu_ , Will. Always. Always.”

“Ahsh…Ahsh ta veh meeloo?” he tried experimentally, sounding more French than Lithuanian. It was so ridiculous Hannibal started laughing while still crying. Will was pressing down too hard on his chest and it hurt and all he wanted was for the pain to never end. He was alive with his love and his happiness was the realest thing he had ever known. “Yes, Will. _Aš tave myliu_.”

“I love you too.”

Hannibal didn't wait. He stole the words from Will's mouth. He captured his lips and sucked and licked those beautiful, banal, impossible words from his tongue. Will moaned into him and the sound nearly destroyed him. Their kiss was frantic, hungry, full of teeth and pulled hair and scratching stubble. They were gasping and panting, clawing at one another to devour the other.

“Fuck,” Will panted and pulled back. They had lost time and grown desperate for more than just the kissing. “I’m going to fucking eat you alive. You’d better heal up soon.” Will collapsed next to him, clasping his hand, forcing a brief detente. They were both breathless and red-lipped, broken and healed.

“Tell me. Tell me what you will do.”

“I don’t even know where to begin. Anything. Everything you want.”

“‘If I _were_ well enough’ you said,” he prompted.  

“I’d ride you,” he replied immediately. “I’d take you raw to the hilt and spray my cum on your face and chest. I don’t even know how to do that but I’d do it for you.”

“I’ll show you.”

“I know. I know you will. I’ve thought of you every day and night since I sent you away.”

“Did you try - ?”

“No,” Will said sharply. “No I waited. I was waiting too, you know. Hiding from it and waiting too.”

Hannibal closed his eyes and slipped inside the halls of his mind. An empty room, without form or substance, sat prepared to be filled with images from that day. It was a room he had not dared conjure until now. “Two weeks, Will. Two weeks and I’ll be ready.”


	2. A Complex Arrangement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will pieces together some critical clues about Hannibal's past. Of course they deal with their issues in "totally healthy" ways. There is shouting, handcuffing, porn, and ridiculous Victorian levels of flower metaphor and fluff.

The rhythmic caress of nimble fingers massaging his scalp felt heavenly. Will was a natural shampooist.

“I look forward to the day when I can reciprocate,” Hannibal said lazily. “I derive great pleasure from this particular activity. And you do have such lovely Botticelli curls.”

Will gave a noncommittal hum, intently focused on his task, trying to contain the foam and water to the head hanging over the bucket.

Hannibal’s mind wandered, first to the Uffizi, then down the alleys of Florence, then up the stairs of the Fell’s Firenze pied-à –terre flat. “Have I ever told you that I often considered drowning Bedelia?”

The fingers froze on his skull. “You washed Bedelia’s hair?”

His eyes flew open. “Forgive me. I spoke carelessly. The two thoughts were in no way connected.” But it was already too late. There was no deceiving the empath when he could see the puzzle pieces. Hannibal had let his ease lull him into inattentiveness. The error was ugly and terribly pedestrian.

“The fuck they aren’t connected. You washed Bedelia’s hair? Watched her bathe? While you played house together in fucking Italy? I _remember_ that god damn bathroom. I was _there_ with that lying little ice queen….right…right before you tried to eat my brain!” The chair scraped loudly against the floor as Will pushed away.

“Will, please,” Hannibal begged.

Will’s features cycled rapidly through a set of emotions as the realization dawned on him. “My god. Of course. She suggested it, didn’t she? Of course she did!” He was growing frantic. “I bet she had you convinced it would be therapeutic!”

His mouth contorted and his eyes shifted and glazed as the pendulum swung. Once. Twice. Three times. He began to narrate the scene with damning precision. 

“I _trigger_ you with exacting purpose. I live in your web at the sidelines. I despise that I share it with someone else. But I _know_ your threads. And I pull juuuust the right ones. Eat your love, Hannibal. Eat your feelings like…like the _first_ time.” Will shook as he forced himself out of the vision, refusing to allow it to continue. He was thoroughly rattled.

“Will, that was the past. We don’t have to live in the shadows of our worst days. Let us focus on making the best of them.”

Will was shaking in fury. He worked his jaw and pointed an accusatory finger at him. “She used her _name_ , didn’t she? To set you off? _That_ is how she did it.”

Hannibal swallowed and looked away.

“Sacrilege,” Will said and paced the room like a caged beast. Hannibal thought he might be empathizing now with his point of view. He was all over the place, his wrathful lamb once more. Will went back to the bedside and set the bucket of water on the chair within reach.

“What are you doing?” Hannibal asked in alarm. He was gearing up to flee and Hannibal could not pursue him in his condition.

Will rudely threw the towel at him. “You can finish shampooing yourself, since you like doing it so fucking much.”

“Will -!”

"FUCK Bedelia!" Will shouted. He stormed out of the bedroom and tromped straight out of the cabin, slamming the doors behind him. He didn’t reappear for the rest of the day.

 

<> 

 

It was on the seventh day into their self-imposed waiting period that Will broached the topic. They were cuddled together in bed. Crickets rasped in the cool evening. Things had been smoothed over more or less peaceably since their unfortunate tiff. Will inevitably came back. He didn't wish to belabor the matter. A simple 'sorry, here's some tea' was all that he offered as explanation. The past was gone. Or so Hannibal devoutly wanted to believe.

“I’m going to ask you a question about your childhood. It’s okay if you don’t want to answer it.”

Hannibal stiffened at the offhand remark, though he appreciated Will's cautious approach. He was using a tactic Alana often deployed. Will even channeled the soft timbre and cadence of her voice when he did it. The genius of his gift disarmed Hannibal such that he almost wanted to smile – a rather remarkable thing, all things considered. Will was wanting to poke at some very bad, unfunny times. “You may ask me. I may or may not wish to answer,” he finally replied.

“You told me once you were a father to your sister. That you cared for her.”

“Yes.” Hannibal tried fixating on the way the firelight had danced across Will’s features that night in his office when they had held the conversation. It helped steady him for whatever maelstrom Will was steering them towards.

“You meant that you _took_ care of her, as well as loved her.”

He nodded.

“Did you bathe her?” Hannibal didn’t dare move. Didn’t dare breathe. If he did, he might strike out. “Did you wash her hair?”

He licked his lips and nodded again.

“Okay. That’s all I needed to know. I won't ask about it again.”

His empath was satisfied. It would take hours for Hannibal to unwind from this encroachment without the release of blood and violence to sooth him. Why Will wanted the information, he could not guess. He did not particularly want to know. Will’s mind could untangle the densest of labyrinths, make leaps between the forts and moats erected for sound self-defense. Not every puzzle could or should be solved.

 

<> 

 

He woke with a cramp in his shoulder. Hannibal moved his right arm to assess which muscle had contracted and felt a tug and clink. His eyes jarred open. He had been handcuffed to the bed.

“Will?” he called. Leaning forward, he saw a note in Will’s messy script and a plastic bag with a burner cellphone and its loose SIM card and battery. His bedpan was there within reach and the jug of water was left full on the side table. A bag of the ready-made bagels he detested were beside it. With his free arm, he picked up the note to read the inevitable confession of why he was presently incapacitated and restrained and left very unadvisedly alone.

_Hannibal,_

_Gone to get food and supplies. Should be back before sundown. Yes – I’ll be safe. Yes – I have the other burner phone and I’ll turn it on once in town. No – do NOT use yours unless it is a life or death EMERGENCY. I’m not going to jail because my ridiculous cannibal gets our cabin pinged on a cell tower just to say hi. Jack WILL be looking for exactly that kind of thing.  We are inside the search radius he’s using in a high probability area. They may easily have NSA help on this. You’re THAT important to them. (Savor that if you’re really angry right now). If you must call, we’ll have under 24 hours max to wipe the cabin and run. _

_I cannot stress this enough: NO – do NOT get out of bed. I know it galls you to have your weaknesses pointed out to you but there it is. You still need to heal and if I have to wait any longer to have all of you just because you wanted to prove how clever you are to escape and pee in ceramic like a civilized man I’m going to see red. And we both know how well that’s worked out for us before. So just, do this for me. Please? (You remember that look, right?)_

 

Hannibal found himself quietly laughing. Will’s mind was wondrous. He’d pre-empted every twist and turn his own thoughts would take, well before he’d made the journey himself.

 

 _Thank you. BEHAVE YOURSELF_. _I’ll be home soon **.**_

He inspected the last sentence more closely. The period was slightly offset, suggesting a pause as he wrote. Will had hesitated. He’d pressed into the paper too hard afterward, expressing determination. He was determined to edit himself. What was he so determined to leave out? Hannibal tried to imagine the scene as Will would, his pen hovering over the line. Behave yourself, he ordered. It was a command. He could see Will snapping at him like one of his dogs with a ‘tsk’. Will used positive reinforcement. He would motivate with a reward. But he didn’t want Hannibal to know about the reward. Didn’t want to make him too curious. Oh, he was curiouser and curiouser now.

“What are you bringing back home, Will?” he asked aloud. He read the final lines with the fizzing pleasure of anticipation.

_Love, W_

_P.S. I’m sorry for the misdirection, but you know how you are. And you know I know how you are. MUCH safer to do this alone. I can still lie my way out. If I get IDed, break your thumb, slip the cuff, and wait. (Don’t roll your eyes, I know you know how to do it, this is a reassurance about our plan, not pedantry.) I will return, Hannibal. Always._

_P.P.S. Don’t misplace this. It is prime physical evidence and it needs to be destroyed. Eat it like the dragon if you must. I already know you’re going to cherish it too much. Fucking sap. XOXO_

Hannibal sighed and let the paper fall over his chest. He would lie in wait, enduring yet another indignity to satisfy his beloved. It would not be the first, nor the last he would suffer for him. At least he could mull over these words and speculate how this endeavor might play out. He would devise layers of plans for each and every possibility. He would be ready when his Will returned, come what may.

 

<> 

 

Hours ticked by and Will did not return.

The afternoon light turned to burnt umber and still Will did not return.

The sun slipped silently below the horizon and there was no sign of him.

At close to midnight, the rumbling engine of the old pickup truck on the dirt track path gave him the relief he needed. The approach neither sounded rushed nor suspiciously slow. A smooth in and out, perhaps, just like his gunshot. Hannibal fussed with his hair, hoping to present a vision of patience and calm, as though he hadn’t spent the day ruminating and fuming and worrying and anticipating and ruminating some more.

Will entered the cabin with a ridiculous amount of noise. Based on the rustling plastic bags and thumping of boots on the floor, he had come back with quite the haul. Enough to merit several trips to shuttle it all in from the vehicle.

“Heya,” he shouted in greeting.

Hannibal pretended not to recognize his voice. “If you are here to rob us,” he called out, “please start with the houndstooth curtains in the bedroom. They are truly _something_.”

Will appeared in the doorway with a huge grin. “Funny you should think of petty larceny. I picked your pocket.”

“I had assumed as much. I hope you took enough cash with you.”

“Yep. All of it. Didn’t spend much though.” Will took off the ball cap he had on and hung it on the doorknob. Reaching deep into his pants, he pulled out a set of small silver keys.

“How was your day?” he asked.

Hannibal stuck his nose into the air and refused to meet his gaze. “Hellish.”

“If I unlock you now, what is my chance of survival?”

“It is predicated on what you have brought as my reward.”

“Well shit,” Will muttered. “How’d you guess?”

“A clerical error and blind luck.”

Will snorted, amused to hear his words thrown back at him. “Thinking of our first date?”

“I’ve been thinking on a great many things today. You left me to wander my palace alone.”

“I’ve already apologized.” Will bent over him and kissed him. “What do I taste like?”

“Whiskey. Wood smoke,” Hannibal replied immediately.

“What do I smell like?” he whispered.

Hannibal inhaled him deeply, drawing up the many scents he bore on his person. Corporate carpeting. Latex gloves. Paper files. Silk rugs - Iranian, not Afghani. Fine grained leather. Luminol. Accelerant. Fire.

And beneath it all, just a passing hint of the unmistakable perfume of Bedelia Du Maurier. His eyes went wide. _He smelled of crime_. “What have you done, Will?” he asked, reverent.

“Can I unlock you safely now?”

“Please.”

Will carefully released the spring on the handcuff and kissed the inside of his wrist where it had chafed. “Thank you for waiting for me.”

Will massaged his shoulder, easing the tension that had built up there. Hannibal stilled his attempts at care, too eager now to feign passivity a second longer. “Show me, Will.” Will smiled and kissed him and Hannibal tasted him again for good measure, irrepressibly curious about the flavors he detected in his mouth.

“Be right back.”

Will banged around in the kitchen for too long. Hannibal used his elbows to leverage himself up as far as he was willing to go while still out of Will’s sightlines. They still had three days before their two week waiting period was through and he wasn’t going risk Will’s wrath by accidentally revealing how much pain he was still in. Will’s fledgling surgery skills required some major work in the near future. He’d caused far more damage than Dolarhyde’s rifle shot ever had- not that he would ever tell him. This was fair atonement for his handiwork with the insulting linoleum knife he’d picked out at a dollar store when his heart seethed and his rage had blinded him. They were even. Even Steven, as Will might say.

When Will returned, he was carrying a tray with two bowls and a bouquet of flowers. Steam curled in misty tendrils, filling the air with a wonderful aroma.

“You brought me homemade soup,” Hannibal noted.

“Just for you. A get well gesture someone once made for me. I was rude and never thanked him properly.”

Will set the bouquet on the nightstand where Hannibal could admire it. “Dahlias are the August birth flower. Are we celebrating a birth?”

“Oh yes,” Will said. “Ours. We were reborn this month. Born properly at last - together. Baptized by blood in the womb of the sea.”

Hannibal smiled at the whimsy in Will’s words. “Some would say you have selected a controversial color.”

“Such a deep crimson it almost looks black.”

“Like the dragons blood we were born in.” Hannibal stroked the miniature knife blade petals on one of the blossoms. “Black dahlias also symbolize betrayal, Will.”

“Betrayal is an important theme in our relationship. Brought us together. Took us apart. Brought us back together. One might say betrayal has shaped much of who we are, where we have been.”

“Which part are we commemorating? The fission or fusion of elemental forms?”

“I’m not commemorating betrayal. I’m eulogizing it. There is no place for betrayal where we are going.”

“I see. So not a warning, then.”

“No. A promise.”

Hannibal exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Black calla lilies and black baccara roses. More death and blood in the moonlight?”

“I’ve always thought of calla lilies as funereal, but I’m told they signify resurrection. Or alternately, fidelity. They show faith and purity in funerals and weddings alike.”

“Appropriate for those who love death as much as they love life.”

“They are committed to both equally, but none more so than to each other. Life and death, bound in matrimony. Two parts of a whole.”

Hannibal positively beamed. “Roses are quite traditional for any occasion, be it a birth, a wedding, or a funeral.”

“They are. Though I guess the dark red rose is a particularly lusty and headstrong flower. A passionate blossom, one might say. Maybe even unpredictable. Mad.”

“There is often great madness in the most epic of tales.”

“So it would seem.”

They were grinning like complete idiots now. “This bouquet is a complex arrangement, Will. It is simply beautiful. I hope you will allow me to preserve it.”

“Certainly. It will always be beautiful then. It will still be beautiful when we’re old and infirm. We’ll take it out and look at it and remember the time we were younger and quicker and more voracious.”

“The moment when the teacup gathered. When we saw the world’s greatness reflected in ourselves.”

Will huffed and crooked his head to the side. “The DSM would label that kind of perspective as a narcissistic pathology.” 

“Ah. The diagnosis might be identically different then. An empathy disorder. Though becoming lost in the powerful grip of another’s design is hardly disordered behavior, in my personal and professional view. Experiencing something great through another's powers is a gift, pure and simple. We would do not to forget.”

Will couldn’t resist squeezing Hannibal’s hand and kissing him again. He preened from the praise and his cheeks were tinged with color.

Hannibal pulled the tray closer in his lap, eager to try his dinner. He stirred the broth and closed his eyes at the smell, trying to analyze and record its every component. Will had never before made him a dish this involved.

“I’m afraid silkies are hard to come by in these parts, but I did my best,” he explained. “Had to venture a bit further afield and a bit longer than I intended for what I was after. You waited so well for me though.” Hannibal nodded, glad Will seemed truly apologetic for the ordeal he had caused him.

At the first sip, the burst of flavor on his tongue was electricity. The broth was rich, full of marrow and balanced with parsley, celery leaves, and ample onion and garlic. The root vegetables were farmed recently, sliced evenly on the diagonal with an eye for presentation. Their consistency was firm and their taste hardy; organic, clearly, and full of vitamins from the clean soil. It would bring him strength. He savored another spoonful. The noodles were hand-rolled and hand-cut – a long gone mother’s recipe perhaps, passed down in the family. A cherished tradition, full of nostalgia straight from the hearth. The meat, well…

“This meat is not chicken, Will.”

“Oh yes. She was a chicken alright. Should have run faster. Won’t be running so quickly now.” Hannibal had to grab the sides of the tray, he was so plainly overcome. He stared at the pale shreds floating in the broth and he felt the urge to cry. Again. No one had ever done such a thing for him before.

“Eat your chicken soup, Hannibal. It’s good for the soul.”

Grappling for composure, he tested whether he was truly experiencing what he thought he was experiencing. “Aged bourbon and cracked pepper. The roasting was done with hickory smoke, yes?”

Will nodded, impressed, and took a bite from his own bowl and chewed. “Is the meat bitter?”

“Yes. Very bitter.”

Will smiled cruelly. “ _Good_.”

The look of his savage, angel-faced creature broke his control entirely. “Is there more or is this it?”

“Loads more. Whole pot. You already want seconds?”

What Hannibal did next, he could not have predicted in a thousand years. He set his spoon down on the tray and lifted his bowl to his mouth. Then he _slurped_. He guzzled the contents in three, four, five big swallows and clanked the bowl back down and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, devil may care. Will laughed,  _delighted_ even.

“Take off your pants,” Hannibal ordered.

“What?” Will said, shocked.

“Take of your pants. Right now.”

“No, Hannibal. Three more days. You said - ”

“I said something arbitrary and it is completely pointless to argue with me. I’m not going to exert myself unless you make me chase you down. And I _will_ chase you down. So you’d best get over here immediately.”

Will started to argue.

“I said _immediately_ , dear boy. I’ll not be denied.”

Will looked at him indulgently and chugged his soup as he usually would have done were no one watching. He went to the mattress and set one knee on its edge. “What are you going to - .” Hannibal’s hands went to his waistband and he popped the button and practically tore his dark navy chinos open.

“Off,” he growled. Will quickly complied and stumbled out of them. Hannibal smoothed a hand over his firm bottom and gave it an unexpected smack. “Closer still. You’re going to have to bring the feast to me.” He pulled Will to his face so he could nosed the flange of his hip. The familiar musk of Will’s skin was slightly fearful, but indisputably aroused. Hannibal caressed the sides of his thighs, gentling him like a flighty stallion.

When the cannibal began to mouth experimentally at Will’s cock, he made sure Will’s eyes were glued to the obscenity of his full lips and sharp teeth closing around him. "Oh _god_ ,” Will prayed in an exhaled breath. Hannibal worked around his entire length with all the cleverness and skill he could muster. His tongue curled around Will’s length like the very serpent in the garden.

“Oh god oh god oh god ohhhhh Hannibal!”

He took him deep into his throat and watched as Will’s head fell back and mouth parted in ecstasy. Perfection. He was Botticelli’s Mercury, looking to the heavens to spread the word. His personal messenger to the gods. Hannibal sucked and sucked, a penitent at the foot of his patron saint. Will’s hand found his hair and he gasped an apology and thrust. Hannibal worked with the movement, taking every rut with ease until he felt Will start to lose it. He quickly grabbed him hard at the base and squeezed, curbing his orgasm in the nick of time. A fat bead of pre-cum dripped from his slit and Hannibal licked it off, burying the tip of his tongue in his hole.

“Oh god, Hannibal. Please. Please. I was so close,” he begged.

“You were too close, my love. I’m going to give you what you want, if you ask.”

His cock bounced in obvious interest. “What I said before?” Hannibal nodded. “How? What do I do?” he asked solemnly.

“Come here. Sit on my face.” It was depraved and he loved allowing himself the vulgarity. It was nothing compared to the wanton licentiousness of eating between the cheeks of Will sculpted, marble buttocks. Will arranged his limbs cautiously, straddling him. The first pass of his tongue had him bracing against the headboard in surprise. The second, Hannibal felt him open. He ravished his tight body, thrilled to hear what sounds he could draw out of it, dipping his tongue into the willing orifice.

“You’re the only thing I want to taste tonight,” he confessed and nipped at the sensitive skin of his inner thighs. Slowly, carefully, he slipped a finger into him and Will gasped at the sensation. “Relax. Close your eyes, Will. I’m going to ease you right through this.”

“Okay.”

“Breathe deeply and slowly. Go to your stream.” Hannibal worked his finger until the resistance died away. “Are you there?”

“Yes. You’re here too.”

“Good. You’re wading slowly. Slower and slower into that calm place. Let the breeze be your breath, gentle and slow.” He pushed a second finger in and felt him clench defensively. His body was hot and tight and it took every ounce of restraint Hannibal had to not have his way with him right then and there. He kept talking to him between little laps and sucks to his groin. It was so much easier to gain entrance to Will’s subconscious now with all of his subliminal signposts still tacked up and held solidly in place, ready to be activated by his hypnotic voice. “You’re breathing calm and gentle, Will. You’re letting me guide you. Don’t fight it. Allow the experience to simply wash through you like the stream.” Will breathed in and out and Hannibal massaged his prostate in sync with his exhalations.

It was not unlike the tantric meditation he himself practiced while incarcerated. Hannibal would time his Kegel contractions and his fantasies of Will to the rise and fall of his chest and cum untouched in his jumpsuit, right there in the middle of his jail floor, crosslegged and hands upturned in the serene  _gyan mudra_ pose. No one ever suspected or knew, save his nurse Denise when she collected his laundry. And Denise understood the value of discretion, even in a place wholly hostile to the concept. Perhaps he and Will could try meditating one day together, copulating in the halls of the mental universe they shared. Anything was possible now.

Hannibal worked his fingers, stretching and lubricating him. He added a third, then finally a fourth. Will grunted and made a plaintive sound.

“I’m a big boy, Will. Just like you said. I need you ready for me.”

“I want to be ready.”

“You’re glorious like this. You’re doing so well. How do you feel?”

“I feel…you. I feel you pleasuring me.”

“Good. Would you like to come back to shore?”

“Yes. Let’s go back.”

“Certainly. Come back to me. Open your eyes. You’re waking to a quiet, safe place. You’re with me.”

Will’s eyes opened and were dark and glassy with lust.

“How do you feel?”

“Keyed up. Unsatisfied.”

“Well. What is to be done about that?” 

Will slithered down the length of Hannibal’s prone form, dragging the covers down with his gleaming teeth. His hands caught Hannibal’s boxers as he went and he kicked the blanket and clothing out of the way. “Tell me what you like,” he whispered as he kissed his way back up Hannibal’s legs.

“Anything you are willing to give.” Will licked a long stripe up the hard member between his thighs and Hannibal made a strangled sound. “Er...maybe not quite anything. That’s a lot. Save me for yourself.”

Will nuzzled the soft skin of his testicles with a cheek and grinned. “You’re such a priss. I bet you didn’t jack off after lights out like the rest of us did.”

Hannibal refused to dignify his snark. He was too busy cataloging every detail of the moment. The deadly sparkle in Will’s eyes. The garish lighting. Those hideous, damnable curtains that would now forever hang inside his memory palace.

“You’re going to have to ask me, too, Hannibal. I want to hear you say it.”

He actually rolled his eyes in response. “Filthy boy.”

“Yes. _Your_ filthy boy.”

Fine. Succumb. Easily done. He was getting used to these demands. “I want you to ride me, Will. Put some real _heat_ into the fucking.”

Will’s mouth dropped open in stunned surprise and the pink flush in his cheeks only served to make him more wanton and virginal. He was at him not a moment after that, grasping Hannibal's hardness by the root and guiding it where he needed it to assuage the throb inside him.

“As much or as little as you please, darling boy. This is all for you.” Hannibal steadied him with his hands, holding his hips in reassurance. It was about all he could do in this state. He felt the press and the heat on the tip as it sunk. They made a choir of moans in duet.

“I love you,” Will sobbed and stroked himself through the stretch. His powerful thighs clenched as he settled down, working himself onto the big cock.

Hannibal’s hands roamed, enjoying the firm muscles rise under his touch, the dusky nipples peaking beneath his fingers. “You ravage me so beautifully,” he confessed, swept away in the ecstasy of this final, hard-won victory.

Will grew bold and leaned back, using an arm between Hannibal’s legs to really take what he wanted. His arched back made his lean pecs and abs flex and his efforts made him glisten with a sweaty dew. “Oh fuck yes,” he moaned, taking Hannibal to the hilt. He bounced and bounced, erection smacking obscenely on his lover’s groin.

It wasn’t long before he warned him. “I’m gonna cum,” Will gasped. “I’ma cum Hann…Hannibal…”

Hannibal gave him two, three, four firm tugs and Will bellowed into the night and pulsed around him. The thick jets spurted up his torso and splattered around his neck. Hannibal didn’t dare move. Will’s aftershocks were intense and Hannibal counted the rush of the heartbeat around his cock. What he was about to do, he would pay for a little now and a lot more later, but it was worth it. In for a penny, in for a pound. Right as Will was coming down off his high, Hannibal rolled his hips violently, forcing Will down at just the right angle.

“Oh fuck!” he cried out.

Hannibal did it again. And again. “Touch yourself,” he commanded and blindly Will’s hand went to his erection. Several more sharp, quick thrusts through the silken heat and Hannibal exploded, burying his seed deep inside Will’s body. The sensation sent Will right back over the edge again and he collapsed forward as the Lithuanian wrung another orgasm from him, painting Hannibal with more of his pleasure.

“What. How. How did you even…” Will panted in the fur of his chest.

Hannibal chuckled and stroked Will’s hair, not caring that the weight of him on his belly felt like fire. He would gladly burn forever to have this.

 

<> 

 

The first hints of rose-glassed light began to illuminate the sky and the birds were already calling to each other through the thickets and the pines.

“We forgot about dessert,” Will said sleepily. He was entwined along Hannibal’s side, knit into him like a permanent feature. He yawned most adorably, a squeaking, happy sound.

“There was dessert?”

“Yeah.”

“We could have it now. For breakfast.” Will kissed Hannibal tenderly and begrudgingly pushed himself up to go make coffee. Several minutes later, he brought Hannibal a piping hot mug of strong, black java and a manila envelope.

“What’s this?”

“Something sweet.”

“Ah. I see,” he smiled and undid the clasp. Two passports fell out, along with a stack of assorted credits cards. He looked over the Canadian passport and then his own. He was now from Denmark.

“They’re completely clean and valid. We’ve got new accounts too. There’s plenty of money, though nowhere near what you had. Your funds are permanently fucked, I’m afraid. They figured out how you were hiding your assets and everything is frozen. Maybe one day we’ll be able to get it out from Interpol’s nose. This is a fresh start in the meantime, courtesy of some seized Colombian drug money pinched from the FBI.”

“How ever did you - .” The industrial carpet he smelled. The file folders. The acrid aroma of Luminol used to detect latent fingerprints. “You an astonishingly resourceful man. You walked right through the FBI’s front doors? That was bold, Will. Very bold.”

“I like to think of it as brazen. I jogged in with the trainees after their morning run and walked straight past Kade Purnell. Tipped my hat at her even. She didn't have the first clue.”

Hannibal fingered his new passport thoughtfully. “I don’t speak Danish. It’s not related to any other language I know.”

Will shrugged. “There aren’t any Danes where we’re going.”

“Where, pray tell, is that?”

“South America.”

“Wonderful.” Hannibal was feeling positively giddy. “When do we leave?”

“As soon as you’re up for the trip. We’ve got a new yacht waiting in port. Hopefully it will pass muster with your tastes. Chiyoh’s making the preparations as we speak. We’ve got enough supplies for now to keep us going here. It’s probably wiser to lay low a few more weeks before making the move.”

“How ever shall we pass the time?” Hannibal quipped.

“In bed, I should think. As we’ve been doing since our arrival.” They laughed then before Will furrowed his brow and grew serious. He cleared his throat and shifted his weight nervously. “There's a second course in this dessert. Maybe not so sweet.”

Hannibal looked at him expectantly. He hadn’t a clue what Will had in store for him. Will rummaged in his pocket. He pulled something out and left it concealed in his hand.

“I brought you something else from the FBI’s evidence locker. I need you to remain calm when I give this to you.”

“What is it?” Hannibal's stomach flipped with anticipation and concern.

“It is something of yours. Something they took when forensics processed your house. They thought it was a trophy. They assumed it was connected to a crime.”

Hannibal swallowed, tongue clicking in his throat.

“It was from a crime, but not one of your doing. I didn’t want you to have to leave this behind. I’d get all your beautiful things out of impound if I could, but it was more important to steal the most valuable thing. The irreplaceable thing.”

Hannibal felt himself begin to quiver, certain now what Will had done for him.

“I know what this is to you,” Will continued. “I know what this means. We don't ever have to talk about it. Just know that I know.”

He pressed the tarnished gold locket into Hannibal’s palm, clasping it between their hands. Inside lay a sprig of harvest gold hair, tied with a faded white silk bow.

Tears streaked from Hannibal’s eyes and Will could not help but shed them too, his empathy unfurled protectively around the man whom he loved.

“You brought her back to me. My...my Mischa,” Hannibal said in barely a whisper.

Will nodded through the shared grief and forced a smile. “Do you want me to leave you alone for a minute?”

Hannibal sniffed and shook his head. “Stay with me. Always.”

“Always, Hannibal. Forever. That's a promise. That's the arrangement.” He reached in his pocket again and slipped something onto Hannibal's finger. "Yes?"

Hannibal looked down at the simple platinum band and nodded helplessly. 

Succumb.

"Yes, Will. Of course. Forever."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this elegy to the amazing three seasons of Hannibal. This fandom continues to be so inspiring and I remain in awe of what Bryan, Mads, Hugh, and Co. gave us. #ItsStillBeautiful <3
> 
> Please leave a comment if you have a moment. They are much appreciated!
> 
> Come say hi to me on tumblr: katamaran10.tumblr.com


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